Where Putin and Trump see eye-to-eye

In this file photo taken on July 16, US president Donald Trump, left, and Russian president Vladimir Putin arrive for a meeting in Helsinki. — Agence France-Presse/Brendan Smialowski

TWENTY-FOUR hours after the historic meeting between president Trump and president Putin, the US media gives no sign of knowing what links these two presidents. It’s not ‘compromat’, and it’s not ‘the invasion (sic) of Ukraine or the ‘taking’ (sic) of Crimea (which was only part of Ukraine from 1954 to 2014, still part of the Soviet Union when the post-World War II borders were officialised…).What the two presidents have in common is an awareness of the fact that the white — or Caucasian — race constitutes only 16 per cent of the total world population. Until now, American politicians, have not seemed to realize that the best way to ensure a viable future for Caucasians is to cooperate closely with the other 84 per cent, which includes 20 per cent of Chinese, 17 per cent of Indians and 18 per cent of Africans. In the face of the ‘multiculturalism’ inspired by Enlightenment morality, the Russian president has demonstrated his conviction that the various races of the world should remain separate, while cooperating closely.That is the underlying logic behind President Putin’s outreach on the world stage, supported by efforts to serve as mediator in a host of international crises, as well as the creation of the BRICS, a really existing entity that links Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and that has its own bank and development fund.Putin’s policies vis a vis Europe imply that he also condemns its failure to control non-Caucasian immigration, which, as Trump said in England, is ‘changing its culture’, boosting far-right parties across the continent. Echoing the US South’s separate but equal policy that was only recently overcome, Putin is convinced that countries of different races should remain ‘separate but equal’ on the world stage, which has an entire different, and positive meaning. While apartheid is based on the conviction that the races are unequal and Caucasians should rule, a multi-polar framework would ensure that the world is run cooperatively.Although Trump appears to believe in the superiority of the white race while Putin does not, they apparently agree on the need to maintain national cultures, and here is where they come together to condemn Europe’s leadership for allowing Christianity to make room for Islam, as I have written recently, it is understandable that some will lament what is a profound cultural change, and yet, Islam is the religion making the most converts, including among the college-educated, its command that humans should treat each other with equality, dignity and respect apparently more appealing than ‘turn the other cheek’. In the post-war years, which I witnessed in France, there was much hand-wringing over coca-cola and bebop, wine producers swearing they would never allow their products to be displaced by the American drink, yet it was not that long before France, after trying to hold on to its colonial possessions, joined the US in wars of aggression that have resulted in both international terrorism and mass migrations.Putting his money where his mouth is, the Russian president recently offered citizenship to South African Boers who are being chased off their land by native populations, and in the same vein one can imagine president Trump inviting Europeans into the United States in order to halt its Hispanisation. When Trump derides Europe, he is not helping Putin take it over; rather the two agree that the ‘old world’ is no longer worthy of respect for having abandoned its Christian — and Enlightenment — culture.As the American media goes on a veritable rampage against Trump for his alleged ‘treasonous’ (yes, treasonous!) behavior vis a vis the Russian president in Helsinki, how many Americans would disagree with Putin’s approach to the survival of Caucasian/Christian peoples in a predominantly Asian/Muslim world?It’s eerie to witness the complete turnaround of the United States from the post-World War II period in which it organized a supra-national system based on cooperation, to one in which US ‘interests’ against all others must prevail.

New Eastern Outlook, July 19. Deena Stryker, an international expert, author and journalist who has been at the forefront of international politics for over thirty years, writes exlusively for the online journal New Eastern Outlook.